Post 407 - Gormire, Garbutt and Great News

My Hoverfly pic in the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust competition

Hey everyone, today's post 407 and today I had an early walk out to Lake Gormire to see what I could
see there. But first I want to say how beautiful it is at Lake Gormire, especially on a lovely day like it was today. And also a big thanks to The Yorkshire Wildlife Trust for running the Nature Reserve above Gormire (Garbutt Wood). As you know I've got a reserves challenge this year where I'm trying to get to as many Yorkshire nature reserves as I can. Well I haven't had much chance to get to many new ones just lately but I don't mind so much as this one is quite close and it is pretty spectacular.

Great Pond Snail (Lymnaea stagnalis)

The yet to be identified
'shrimp' on land

Before I tell you more about my walk I also want to say a big thanks to the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust for running their photography competition. I was thrilled to come second in the Wildlife Watch

The rescued Alderfly

And in the water

category with the Hoverfly picture I entered. Thank you for blowing up my two pictures and the lovely book! I'm already busy trying to get better shots for next years competition.

Now, Garbutt Woods and Lake Gormire! I saw quite a few birds and  that you expect to see in a forest and a lake. Mallards, Tufted Duck, Swans, Sparrows, Chaffinches, Robins, Long Tailed Tits, and I heard some goldfinches but didn't see them. The wood are really lovely at the minute as there are l;ots of beautiful wild flowers out, Bluebells being the most prominent as the pictures will show but also some amazing little flowers such as Wood Sorrel and Wood Anemone which I love as it is a great indicator of Ancient Woodland. They don't set seed but spread by growth of its root structure. This is slow though! It grows something like 6ft every 100 years so seeing a good sized patch is very hard work sometimes, but Garbutt Woods seems to be the place to go to see it!

Bluebells at Garbutt

Wood Anemone

Marsh Marigold

The lake is great for with marine life too. I see lots of things there. Dad rescued an Alderfly that was on its back in the water, he put it on a holly leaf to dry out and soon it was fine and able to fly off. The first was I think only my second ever wild Water Snail and the other, what me and my Dad took to be Freshwater Shrimp. the sad thing was though, that they were all on land, and they really didn't seem to like it, they were wriggling about but not getting anywhere. So we took some pictures on land quickly first just to make sure we had some, and then put them all into the water where they all seemed to be much happier. We then got a couple of pictures of them as we watched them for a while. After that we carried on with our walk around the lake to finish off the walk, but not before I had a good go on the rope swing that is there too!

Wheee......

So, all-in-all quite a successful walk I would say.

Hope you enjoyed,

Z.